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Bethesda Announces Dishonored Release Date

Jumping into the slot vacated yesterday by BioShock Infinite, Bethesda and Arkane Studios announced this morning that their own fantastical guns-and-powers playground, Dishonored, will open its doors on October 9.

Color me surprised. The Arkane devs have been pitching the vast creative killing options available to Dishonored players, going so far as to encourage people to try and "break" the game. Typically, when options like that are available to players, it means a lengthy development and QA process of finding and fixing unbalanced exploits. I had Dishonored pegged for a 2013 release at the earliest.

The similarities to BioShock are there, with the mix of powers and weapons, and given that just yesterday 2K announced Infinite would be delayed until February 2013, it looks like Bethesda is trying to capitalize on an unexpected opportunity.

What's that mean for gamers? Well, aside from the fact we'll get a very cool looking new franchise sooner than expected, it could also mean Dishonored won't be polished to a shine at launch. This is Bethesda we're talking about here, and there is a lengthy track record of buggy launches. The team at Arkane is an experienced one, though, so we'll give them the benefit of the doubt for now.

We'll have more on Dishonored for you at E3 where Bethesda is promising a hands-on demo.